All Elite Wrestling founder, co-owner, president and CEO Tony KhanPerry Knotts/Getty Images
The WWE should thank AEW for its current white-hot run. It wouldn't have been possible without them.
Without AEW, Cody Rhodes doesn't finish his story. Without AEW, CM Punk doesn't return to the world of professional wrestling. Without AEW, Jade Cargill isn't one-half of WWE's women's tag-team champions.
From a financial and operational standpoint, the impact created by All Elite Wrestling has been immense.
Without AEW, wrestlers wouldn't have the leverage to negotiate the massive deals they've received over the last five years.
Without AEW, WWE isn't prompted to move NXT from a streaming service to cable television on USA, to the recent five-year rights deal with CW starting in October.
Without AEW founder Tony Khan, the Forbidden Doorman himself, the wider world of wrestling would still be isolated primarily to one product instead of developing into the industry's version of the MCU multiverse. After all, Triple H's original plan revolved around "global localization".
At the time, the current head of WWE creative said, "I quickly realized NXT needed a feeder system of it's own. We had to re-imagine again how and where we were recruiting. We had to find the right people not only inside of the United States but outside as well."
NXT-style takeovers of a foreign country's wrestling scene ended up failing, with established promotions and talents resisting the lure of Titan Towers.
Currently, an AEW-contracted talent, Jon Moxley, is the reigning IWGP World Heavyweight Champion for New Japan Pro Wrestling. This year's Forbidden Door pay-per-view is expected to include AEW, New Japan, Stardom and CMLL. Wrestlers, who are independent contractors, understand the value of working multiple shows, promotions and territories.
As this talent swapping grows, WWE even started in on the act, with contracted talent working shows for Pro Wrestling NOAH, All Japan Pro Wrestling and Game Changer Wrestling and foreign promotions now looking to strengthen their relationship with the industry leader.
Local Globalization
All Elite Wrestling's presence is critical to the industry's ecosystem.
With the five-year anniversary next week at Double or Nothing, the startup has been a resounding success by any measure. The flagship show, Dynamite, regularly finds itself among cable's top-five original programming each and every Wednesday. AEW sold the most tickets ever to a live professional wrestling event, with 2023's All In PPV in London. Warner Bros. Discovery just greenlit a fourth program—Meal & A Match—to go along with Dynamite, Rampage and Collision. The fans have benefited with outstanding match quality and options.
Life is full of choices. co*ke or Pepsi. McDonald's or Wendy's. Ford or Chevy. Wal-Mart or Costco. WWE or AEW.
Brand consumerism forms the bedrock of American capitalism. Maybe you don't want to choose between two. Maybe you choose to enjoy both or select neither. As the great Geddy Lee sang, "If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice."
In the world of wrestling, WWE is a monolith, while AEW is the upstart. In an industry dependent on creativity and innovation, the latter changed the game, so to speak.
"Also, with the industry, if you ask, people are going to be happy that this company is flourishing, not just one as a monopoly," current AEW TNT champion Adam Copeland told Chris Van Vliet.
"Even when I was with WWE, I always said, 'This is no good. This is no good for the industry to just be one place.' I still believe that. I believed it all through the years we were the only place and I was world champion. I was like, 'One place is no good.'
"Imagine just going to one restaurant for the rest of your life. It'd get pretty old. ... Eventually, you hit everything on the menu."
AEW's "Rated-R Superstar" can current TNT champion Adam CopelandNicole Osborne/NHLI via Getty Images
Under Constant Attack
Khan's vision ignited a third golden era, where access and variety have never been greater.
Is the product perfect? Of course not. AEW receives its share of criticism, fairly or unfairly. Some should be addressed; others are bad-faith arguments created by social media grifters fishing for engagement and online monetization.
Keep the following in mind: Once this year's Double or Nothing event concludes later this month, AEW will officially enter its sixth year of operation. For comparison, Jim Cornette's Smokey Mountain Wrestling folded after five years, while the Eric Bischoff creation of WCW Monday Nitro lasted six-and-a-half years.
"People can be so negative," Copeland told Sports Illustrated's Justin Barrasso. "That's people who are wrestling, and that's also among our fan base. There are people who have this super rigid 'I'll only watch and celebrate this one thing.'
"For us in the industry, it's completely different. We want each other to succeed. It's an awesome way to make a living, don't get me wrong, but it's a tough way, too. When more than one company is flourishing, that's a positive for all wrestlers. But there is this strange outlier of fan who looks at things from a different perspective. So I wanted to address that, and I wanted our locker room to hear it, too."
Yet the barrage of negativity found online is non-stop. Why? Because people discovered that negative AEW reactions draw attention. Entire accounts and podcasts have built their identity around tearing down the product. This isn't a "both sides" argument, either. The vitriol spewed toward the company that hasn't existed for over 60 years significantly outweighs anything from the opposite direction.
Thursdays between 4-5 p.m. ET, when Dynamite's weekly ratings are usually reported, are a nightmare for fans trying to simply enjoy their preferred product. At one point in time, these numbers were important because AEW and WWE were going head-to-head. AEW pushed NXT off Wednesday nights. Khan won that showdown. Now, the goalposts have shifted.
Being a top program on nightly television isn't good enough for fans who have no actual stake in the matter, even though WBD's actions show it's quite happy with the product.
A decline in overall cable ratings—which won't matter at all once WWE RAW moves to Netflix—isn't taken into account by those who so desperately crave online validation. Instead, the "dying brand" or "WCW 2000" comments are consistent, as if the wrestling world is somehow better off without another major promotion employing hundreds of people.
Tribalism found in pro-wrestling discourse nearly rivals the political sphere. It's boorish and caters to the lowest common denominator of supporting your team and trashing the other.
Styles Clash
The misunderstanding that occurs for many is that the biggest and most profitable entity is also the best. Much like movies or music, professional wrestling is subjective. The style a viewer prefers dictates what's actually good.
Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer wasn't the top grossing moving of 2023. Yet the film nearly swept this year's Academy Awards by winning Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, Best Cinematography, Best Film Editing and Best Original Score.
For some professional wrestling fans and critics, a quality product is based purely on attendance or bottom line financial draw. It's narrow-minded.
However, success breeds jealousy and disdain. The New England Patriots became the "Evil Empire" during Tom Brady's heyday. Numerous fan bases around MLB relish seeing the New York Yankees lose. Every LeBron James action is scrutinized to the nth degree.
Social media serves as a barometer of AEW's growth throughout the last five years. Go ahead and search the company on Twitter. You'll immediately find a myriad of accounts tearing down the product.
Ironically, it just shows that people are paying attention. They're reacting because their version of the status quo has been challenged. They're willing to tear down everything that's been built to support some idealized version of the industry that never existed.
Cult of Personality
The same tired arguments continue to be regurgitated throughout the internet wrestling community and those positioned to discuss wrestling intelligently, yet fail to do so.
"AEW doesn't tell stories."
During the last five years, the Bloodline saga and Adam "Hangman" Page's descent into depression and subsequent rise to become world champion have been the best told stories in professional wrestling.
The Elite in their current version have leaned into everything everyone has said about them in public and turned those complaints into their best characters to date.
Callbacks abound for those who watch the programming regularly, such as Nick Wayne attacking Swerve with a framed picture of his family when the latter did the same to the former during his heel run nine months ago.
The much-maligned decision to show the backstage Punk footage from All In worked in building up Jack Perry as a heel, who's getting good reactions since that aired. It wasn't just used to be a "gotcha moment" where the veteran clearly instigated the scuffle. Instead, AEW built a story around Perry's absence and changed attitude.
Even when story lines crash at the end, like Adam Cole's reveal as the Devil at December's Worlds End, AEW was doing exactly what many claim it doesn't.
While the promotion relies heavily on in-ring performances, stories proliferate weekly programming.
"AEW doesn't sell moves, has too many spots and lacks in-ring psychology."
Too often, old heads are heard saying today's wrestlers need to slow down. This exact argument has been made for decades, with those opposing the drop kick then top-rope moves on to modern sequences.
Today's wrestlers are the best athletes ever in the squared circle. They can do things guys in the steroid-laden 80s or the slowed-down 90s couldn't have even dreamed of accomplishing.
When Will Ospreay met Ricochet in Japan eight years ago, a watershed moment occurred. Ospreay is now the top guy in AEW. Meanwhile, the WWE built a new division around Ricochet.
In certain ways, the WWE is now programming more toward AEW's audience.
The WWE Speed Championship on X is one instance where high-octane matches with a move-heavy approach are necessary to fulfill the limited time requirement. The ongoing King and Queen of the Ring Tournaments are being featured with certified bangers on television, much like how AEW presented its Continental Classic toward the end of last year.
Most of the venom stems from a dislike of the Young Bucks, particularly how they spam superkicks (yet the Usos are often forgotten in this conversation). But the Bucks received the seal of approval from an unassailable all-time great in Sting when he chose them to be his final opponents.
"I've watched how they conduct themselves, and I don't care what anybody says or rumors that might be out there, they are as top notch as can possibly be" Sting told Barrasso.
"I've watched how they conduct themselves, and I don't care what anybody says or rumors that might be out there, they are as top notch as can possibly be. I don't see any flaws in these guys in the ring. Their ability to make everybody better, and not just themselves, is not something many do."
"AEW needs to stop mentioning WWE."
This critique goes both ways, right? No? Well, that's odd.
The WWE has consistently taken shots at its competition, whether it's Vince McMahon discussing the promotion in a quarterly earnings conference call or HHH degrading those who don't sign with the company on a nationally televised talk show.
To be fair, most the of the WWE's mentions aren't made on its programming. These shots are usually taken through other channels. Though Punk made a reference to choking Perry during an in-ring promo just last week.
These are but three examples. More can be added.
Competition is good. A little saltiness makes it even better. The Monday Night Wars were ablaze with both companies going tit for tat. The issue isn't the shots themselves. It's the double-standard that exists for one promotion and not the other.
"AEW isn't really competition for WWE."
Tell that to WWE's legal representation, which labeled AEW as "far from being a de minimis competitor" in a response to a lawsuit levied by Major League Wrestling claiming a violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act.
Since the newer promotion's onset, the WWE has done everything in its power to undercut the fledgling competitor. While the company's talking heads say otherwise, their actions speak far louder.
"AEW shows too much blood."
This particular gripe is individual preference. An old pro-wrestling cliche states that "red equals green."
Unlike the WWE, AEW has never geared itself toward a PG product. One of the most revered matches in the promotion's history—Cody Rhodes v. Dustin Rhodes—is a bloodbath, with the elder sibling spouting viscous liquid all over the ring.
Could AEW pull back on some of these things? Sure. The company has seemed to juice less as of late, while the WWE actually has started to use the tactic a little more.
A limit exists to everything. Whereas improvements are always necessary.
When AEW Becomes All Elite
With AEW's women's division finally receiving extra attention after four-and-a-half years of lipstick service, other matters can be addressed.
First, the championship picture can be clarified. With the amount of belts currently found in the promotion, a more defined delineation between each is necessary. As an example...
- World Championship: Top title treated as such.
- TNT Championship: Open challenge format
- Continental Championship: Workhorse belt defended through Continental Classic and accompanying rules
- International Championship: Defend this belt all over the world through multiple working partnerships
- FTW Championship: De facto hardcore title
Those are simply the men's top titles. The tag and trios divisions speak for themselves, though they shouldn't be forgotten for vast stretches, as they are at times. The women only currently have a pair of titles in the World and TBS, which essentially work the same as their counterparts.
Second, the Ring of Honor product needs to be stricken from AEW programming. The crossover hasn't worked. The extra titles are too much. Certain talents should be on cable instead of streaming and vice versa. ROH should be treated as AEW's developmental brand.
Third, the rankings can't come and go. They either need to be fully implemented or forgotten. Halfway measures do nothing for booking purposes. AEW is a sports-based promotion. Consistency is necessary in that regard.
From a business standpoint, AEW's production value has increased over time, with improved shots and angles of the action. Still, the production truck still misses too many key moments—one is too many—while sound issues have been a consistent problem from Day 1.
As for declining weekly attendance, which has slowly shifted in recent weeks, untapped locales should be sought.
On Thursday, AEW and the City of Arlington announced a partnership to host a summer series of events at the Esports Stadium Arlington, which is a new venue for professional wrestling.
More international stops should be in the cards as well. A Forbidden Door in Japan or Mexico would tear the house down.
(From left to right) AEW's Adam Cole, Thunder Rosa, Darby Allin and Orange CassidyBennett Raglin/Getty Images for ReedPop
Bottom line, AEW should do what it does best. It's where the best in-ring action occurs, and it has the roster to back up that claim. Ospreay, Bryan Danielson, Kazuchika Okada and Kenny Omega, when healthy, are four of the very best to ever do it.
Swerve, Page, Perry, Copeland, Cole, Jon Moxley, Maxwell Jacob-Friedman, Jay White, Pac, Samoa Joe, Darby Allin, Claudio Castagnoli, Daniel Garcia, Katsuyori Shibata, Orange Cassidy, Konosuke Takesh*ta, Rey Fenix, Roddy Strong, Pentagon Jr., Rush, Kyle Fletcher, Kyle O'Reilly, Buddy Matthews, Brody King, Mark Briscoe, FTR and the Bucks are all stellar workers that show off the sheer depth of the men's roster.
It's a killer lineup in the men's division, with a growing women's division that now features Mercedes Moné, Deonna Purrazzo and Mariah May to go along with Toni Storm, Thunder Rosa, Willow Nightingale, Kris Statlander and the eventual returns of Jamie Hayter and Britt Baker.
The best way to sell the promotion is by putting on banger after banger after banger. The quality of those matches and the individuals involved will continue to push everyone else in the industry. A consistently high-quality product can then take advantage of any post-Wrestlemania malaise as the competition transitions away from its biggest story line of the last 25 years, while also losing its two biggest stars for a significant chunk of time.
AEW may not be at its peak right now, but professional wrestling is a better place with the promotion alive and well. Khan and Co. already achieved far more than many initially expected. They'll continue to do so, and this "dying brand" will make fools of those who continue to doubt it, while other promotions also benefit from wrestling's changed landscape.
Follow Brent Sobleski on Twitter, @brentsobleski.
